Youssef Rakha, Egyptian writer and editor of the international online publication The Sultan’s Seal (aka Cosmopolitan Hotel Cairo), recently posted to his site twelve of his own original poems, translated from the Arabic by Robin Moger. That posting draws significance for several reasons: both writer and translator are professionals published elsewhere in traditional forms – literary,…

A fun and generous review of Alma Lolloon has appeared on Amazon. Here is a link, and I’ve pasted the review below: by, Rucker Trill 5.0 out of 5 stars so I must write to tell you how much I liked it. Right off the bat I thought July 4, 2018 Format: Paperback|Verified Purchase Dear Miss…

Day job workers share in common evenings. Time off, free time, leisure time, time-wasting, occupy the evenings. What to do? The question often haunts office and factory workers (workers clutching daytimer calendars are bothered by another version of the question). The evening absorbs the question of what to do like a fountain swallows wish thrown…

The Phenomenology of Error[i] A solo Mission at the Ranger Station before group poetry night, hoping for a good napkin poem. When we read like police we make a criminal[ii] shot with red pencil corrections, the poet apprehended, booked. Pull over the rotting rhymester! Handcuff this conceptualist clown. Arrest that academic asshole. Ticket the doggerel…

Just as we might ask a critic not to call not good a work for not being what it is not intended to be, we might remember expecting a like from any particular audience predisposed to dislike the chosen form doomed to deletion. We often think others think like we do, but they probably don’t….

When Seinfeld the television show was on, a guy in my office gig at the time used to come by my desk in the morning after each episode and ask me did I see Seinfeld last night. I never did. My colleague would then repeat over the course of the day practically the entire episode…

What are we reading? Joe wrote a book. Really? What’s it called? Penina’s Letters. Who’s Penina? Are there any cats in Joe’s book? One, Castus. Hmm. I hear Joe’s working on a sequel. Tell him to put more cats in it. “Penina’s Letters,” get yr copy!